


A Silent Play (in the shadow of power)

by Thingsareswinging



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, F/M, Guerrilla Warfare
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-18 09:21:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29115936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thingsareswinging/pseuds/Thingsareswinging
Summary: He's the spiritual figurehead of a revolution. She's the face of the occupying regime. He thinks it's fun to have a nemesis, she thinks that kind of thing is unprofessional.
Relationships: Aang/Azula (Avatar)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 33
Collections: Avatar Rarepair Exchange 2021





	A Silent Play (in the shadow of power)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Drenched](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drenched/gifts).



> Things I should not be trusted with: the tag 'Alternate Universe- Historical' with no further clarifying details.

“...Ugh, can’t believe I’m having to use  _ these _ pieces of crap,” Toph declared, rummaging through her belongings. “Fascists can’t make hand grenades worth  _ shit.” _

“Toph you know there’s usually nothing I love more than hearing your opinions on personal ordnance, but I’m kind of in the middle of something here-”

Sokka was slumped over the radio, right hand holding the one remaining half of a headset to his ear, while his left absently twirled a pencil around his fingers. Suddenly, he sat up straight with a jolt, and the lead danced across the paper.

“Window’s closing. They’re setting up artillery on the ridge.”

Aang looked up with a start.  _ Finally.  _ Something to  _ do. _

“I can handle that. If everyone else is busy.”

Sokka looked pained. “I mean, everyone else  _ is _ , but-”

Aang was on his feet before the rest of Sokka’s lecture could get him down again, and he darted out of the ruined safehouse, plaintive reminders of how bulletproof he wasn’t ringing in the air as he went.

* * *

Really, it was kind of flattering that they’d set up a whole battery of field guns just for him- and that was kind of the point, right? That every unit of whatever-bore-guns-these-were (Sokka and Toph kept trying to explain these kinds of things to him and he had to keep reminding them that he could fly, and therefore he was excused from caring about how many centimetres across a gun barrel was) diverted to try and blow him and Appa out of the sky meant one more unit that  _ wasn’t _ turning some village the next valley over into paste. But still, you’d think they’d have learned by now that a bunch of guys that had to spend ten minutes doing complicated math before they even thought about aiming at where he might be just wasn’t going to keep pace with The Actual Avatar.

Aang was just surveying the tidy mess he’d made of the place when cold metal jutted against the back of his skull, just above the spine.

“Hmm. Saffron? Really? On your knees, if you would.” A girl’s voice, inches from his ear.

Compliance didn’t cost him anything, so, as politely as he could, he sank to the ground. He even obligingly held his hands out behind him. If his practiced nonchalance put her out in any way, he couldn’t tell it from the way she cuffed his wrists together.

Once he was secured to her satisfaction, she sauntered into view, and sat on the titled wreck of the barrel of a field gun, pistol out but not pointed anywhere in particular.

He’d had a lot of guns pointed at him, recently. Most of the time it had been by middle-aged soldiers with big sideburns, but sometimes it had been by pretty girls, so it wasn’t  _ that _ that made this one different. There was something in the way she held the gun, off to one side, not gesturing to it, not drawing attention to it. If he didn’t know better he’d have called it distaste, but- no, that wasn’t the word, it sounded similar, though, if he could just-

“You know,” she said, conversationally, “there have been studies on the effect of field artillery on its operators. Medically, I mean. A professional boxer might take anywhere between two and three thousand blows to the head over the course of their career.” She paused, either for dramatic effect or to see if her non-sequitur had thrown him any, but he’d been lectured by Sokka, so being casually expected to keep up with complete changes in topic wasn’t even a little surprising any more. “A retired boxer is tens of times more likely than the average civilian to exhibit anger issues, alcohol abuse, dementia, the usual kind of thing. For a long time the obvious link was that the kind of brute that hit people for someone else’s entertainment was just naturally the sort of person who couldn’t function in society without the lubricant of violence.”

Aang nodded along, to indicate he was listening. Which he was! Learning new things was never a waste of time. Today’s lesson: why to avoid getting hit in the head was smart.

“But the more we learn about the brain the more we learn how little internal control we have. A lifetime of getting hit in the head does  _ terrible _ things to our minds, in quite stark physical terms. Doctors started calling it  _ dementia pugilistica _ , because doctors have no imagination at all. And then an inquiring mind began to notice  _ remarkably _ similar symptoms emerging among our veteran artillerists, soldiers who might never have taken a blow to the head in their lives.”

Another pause, to gauge interest. Aang idly tried to come up with a pun about captive audiences, but couldn’t arrange the sentence right before she started again-

“It’s the shocks, you see. Every time a shell is fired it creates a shock, and an artillerist might fire hundreds of shells in a  _ day. _ A hundred tiny blows to the head, rattling their brains against their skulls. A hazard  _ nobody _ expected.”

Her face set, no longer amused.

“Every month brings us another study, another point of data. Every month we find a new way this war is destroying us. This study is only the most recent example, and it’s the kind of thing that will  _ inevitably _ cause my brother to lobby for a reduction in artillery deployment. This is because my brother is an idiot. Strong as an ox, and twice as dull. He has a good heart, for what  _ that’s _ worth.”

“My father would shell every  _ inch _ of this country, if that was what victory took. My brother would see us fight  _ honourably, _ for another hundred years until the last two survivors  _ honourably _ shoot each other, looking each other in the eye while they do it, like civilised people. I had a different plan. A quick end to the war, a decisive push. Father listened to me. And it almost worked. Until you.”

Aang blinked, bleary from the monologue. “Oh man this is gonna be so awkward but I... I have no idea who you or your brother or your dad are.”

For the first time that evening, she looked like she had absolutely no idea what to say next. He took advantage of this moment of confusion to throw her handcuffs at her head before turning tail and accelerating into the night.

Disdain! That had been the word!

* * *

“Aang! What took you?”

“Oh, you know. Got ambushed by some officer who held me at gunpoint while lecturing me about boxers.”

“Huh. Well, I guess no-one can resist a captive audience.”

* * *

They kept meeting. By which he meant she kept showing up behind him and pointing a gun at him, and he kept foiling schemes she would inevitably be attached to.

Which was weird. That was weird, right? It was a big country, and thanks to Appa they were way more mobile than basically anyone, at least since Sokka and Toph blew up the airship hangars. So how come she always knew which big overdesigned superweapon he’d be running into?

“Aang, please stop talking about her like she’s someone you keep running into at market,” Sokka pleaded, often and at great length. “We absolutely have to shoot her, you know this.”

And another thing- how come it was never  _ her _ overdesigned superweapon? They’d done some asking around, and if even a tenth of the things they’d heard about the infamous Princess Azula weren’t complete lies, she seemed  _ way _ more qualified to be running things than basically any of the Sideburn Brigade that they kept putting in charge. How come she kept acting like a glorified security guard?

“I don’t know, Aang, maybe our constant heroic foiling of her evil plots is bad for her reputation or something.’

* * *

It was kind of fun, having a nemesis! Other than Ozai, who he guessed was also his nemesis, except he’d never even met that guy and Azula at least had the decency to show up in person. And she was precise and clever and unlike certain Admirals she’d never ordered the wholesale destruction of entire communities.

Which was nice. Even when she’d conquered Ba Sing Se she’d done it without firing a shot.

“I am not your  _ nemesis,” _ she growled, sparks crackling across her fingers. “You are  _ in my way.” _

“You say that,” he replied, miming checking his watch as he bent backwards under the resultant bolt of lightning, “but you keep following me around and attaching yourself to supertanks that I need to blow up. Speaking of-”

He grinned just in time for the distant explosion of fuel tanks to echo through the jungle, an emphatic submission of evidence _. _ Him and Toph had got  _ so good _ at dramatically timing explosions.

“Alright, see you next time there’s something that needs blowing up, bye.”

* * *

It had all been fun, with the caveat that she was actually trying to kill him and advance the agenda of a genocidal regime. But fun all the same- she’d been an attitude, a puzzle, a silhouette that had lectured him about brain damage and always looked like she didn’t expect him to get away.

Then her brother showed up. And had just made everything  _ complicated _ .

* * *

Before, she’d known when to retreat. Before, she’d played by the same rules he had. Now there was something driving her forward, something desperate in her eyes. He was pretty sure he knew what it was.

“I’m not leaving without you,” she snarled, and it was probably meant to be a warning.

Aang found himself shaking his head, the adrenaline fizzing away. This wasn’t fun any more.

“You have to know you’ve got other options. There’s not a way this ends with you getting what you want.”

“It’s not about what I  _ want _ -” she snapped, but he interrupted her.

“I can beat him,” he said, dead serious. “We both know it.”

She howled, and a wave of blue fire filled the air. He left his disapproval hanging, and vanished.

* * *

Sokka stared blankly at the handset of the telephone, before sighing and turning to Aang.

“It’s for you,” he said, as he handed it over, and there was a look on his face Aang probably should have recognised.

“Hello?”

_ “In three weeks, the Fire Lord will be overseeing the reconstructed air force, at an airfield fifty miles south of the Caldera.” _

Aang couldn’t help the grin tugging at his face. “It’s a date.”

She hung up, but it wasn’t a no.


End file.
